SpaceX’s Falcon 9 and Crew Dragon liftoff from Cape Canaveral, Florida with the Ax-1 crew on board | Image: NASA/Joel Kowsky
This morning, SpaceX successfully launched a new crew of four astronauts to orbit on the company’s Crew Dragon spacecraft — a group that includes three customers who have reportedly paid millions for their seats. The four private flyers, riding to space with a commercial aerospace company called Axiom Space, are now en route to the International Space Station after launching from Cape Canaveral, Florida, on SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket.
When they dock with the ISS tomorrow morning, they’ll become the first entirely private crew of astronauts to visit and live on the orbiting lab. The crew is slated to spend roughly eight days on the ISS, where they’ll conduct a total of 25 science experiments lasting a cumulative 100 hours.
